


A Heavy Inheritance

by MercuryGray



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Future Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-29
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-17 02:48:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5851234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MercuryGray/pseuds/MercuryGray
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is over twenty years since the Revolution finished, and life has quieted down considerably for Edmund Hewlett and Anna Strong. Safely back in England, married, and living in a modest country house,  their six children are everything a pair of parents could wish -- smart, witty, and successful in their own endeavors.</p>
<p>But a series of events gives their eldest daughter the opportunity to wonder: Does one ever really know one's parents? Does one wish to?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Heavy Inheritance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CalamityBean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CalamityBean/gifts).



> I posted the following headcanon on my tumblr the other day: 
> 
> After the war, Hewlett and Anna move back to England and get married. They buy a small house out in the country where Hewlett builds an observatory. Their children are all named after constellations or celestial bodies, are all smart as hell, and get into very involved scientific/political/historical discussions at dinner. Everyone has an opinion, and everyone gets to voice said opinion.  
> Potential suitors are terrified. Jane Austen-esque shenanigans ensue.
> 
> And people were genuinely excited! Calamity Bean actually wrote a whole paragraph in support of the idea, and Capetian asked for several hundred thousand words on the subject. I was not able to oblige with several hundred thousand, but after a whole day of work, here is my small contribution. I dedicate this to both of them.

It promised to be a quiet morning at Langfield House. The sun, just settling its gauzy shawl over the untrimmed gardens, was warm and resonant, its beams picking up a few bees helping themselves to the flowerbeds, and the clouds seemed to have quit the area for unhealthier climes.

 

The light was, in short, very good, which was why Andromeda Hewlett was taking full advantage of the opportunity to finish her sketches. She had gotten up early for the purpose -- but then, she was always up early, to the consternation of the servants. It took the new maids some getting used to, to find Miss Hewlett awake, reading or sketching, when they came in to lay the fires. (More than one had gone crying to the Cook complaining of even earlier hours, and been told, kindly, that no routine need be altered -- that Miss Hewlett had always risen early, would continue to do so, and had very few demands in the ways of fires when she did.)

 

She was considering today a specimen of  _ Anacamptis morio _ , the green-winged orchid, very helpfully collected and potted for her by the village curate on one of his walks.(Her passion for botany was well-known in the neighborhood, and it was not uncommon for such gifts as pressed flowers and, indeed, sometimes whole live plants, to make their way from pockets and pushcarts up to Miss Andromeda’s bedroom, or her greenhouse.) So careful was her attention to the detail of the plant that she hardly heard her father, in whose study she was now working, come up behind her and observe, with his usual attention to detail, “What a rather well-developed hood.”

 

“Good morning, Papa.”

 

“Good morning, darling daughter,” Edmund Hewlett said, kissing the crown of his daughter’s head so as not to disturb her work. “Your mother will worry if you do not eat something, you know.”

 

“I was not hungry,” she replied, continuing with focused determination to perfect the curve of stem in her pencil-limmed sketch of the plant before her. “I’ll have something later.”

 

Hewlett, well-used, by now, to both the moods of his wife and his eldest daughter, merely rolled his eyes and settled into his own desk, scattered about with papers and charts. In this father and daughter were the same --  _ mens sana in spatus indispositionum _ , a sound mind in an unsound space.

 

They had not always worked thusly -- in her distant childhood, when her mother had the keeping of her education, they were forbidden from their father’s study, told many times that they were not to disturb him or his work. Their classrooms and offices filled every other corner of the house -- Was Cook baking bread? They would watch it rise! Was the gardener weeding? They would consider his findings and debate upon what makes a weed! -- and the Langfield farms.  When one of the tenants was seeding a field, the Hewlett children would be on hand to learn about seed germination and the effects of rain. When a wall was being built or a house constructed, off the children would go to consider architecture, strain, load, and the particular physical properties of wood or stone. Frequent trips to London for her father’s presentations to the Royal Society turned out all manner of learning opportunities, not the least of which was the Royal Society itself -- always filled with interesting people and interesting things, some of whom, elevated of mind though they were, thought it no difficult task to entertain another body (albeit that of a very small child) about the rigours of the universe or the latest designs for steam engines. 

 

It had been an enlightening existence. And one that, along the way, offered Andromeda Hewlett, second-oldest of the Hewlett children, the opportunity to appreciate silence -- the kind offered by her father’s study, and a rare commodity among a house holding six siblings. When, one day, she slipped out of the schoolroom with her book, made her way upstairs, and installed herself without comment across from her father’s desk to read, he hardly noticed she was there until the maid came in with tea and his gaze drew up from his papers long enough to notice his daughter, then perhaps fourteen, tucked into one of the deep armchairs, content as a king. He said nothing, except to mention, when dinner finally approached, that she had better make use of the bookmark he was offering and join them for the meal. It would be their secret, he said.

 

She had not left after that. A desk was given over to her personal use, a shelf set aside for her books. The maids made a point to check the study to water the plants she left there overnight. And they peacefully went on as though the arrangement had existed for years, which suited everyone splendidly.

 

There was an experimental chord on pianoforte keys downstairs, breaking the relative morning quiet, and both Hewletts looked up. “Your sister is practicing rather early this morning,” her father observed, as a pair of spirited hands began flying over the keyboard.

 

“She wished to make sure her playing was good for Lady Hampton’s, this Friday,” Andromeda put in, offering the enlightened perspective that only a sister (and a roommate) can give.

 

“Oh, yes, there is that, isn’t there? Will you sing, do you think?”

 

“Only if she asks, Papa. Cassie is very touchy about it ever since Mrs. Fairchild complimented my singing over her playing. I felt very badly about it.”

 

“Mmm.” But there was little time to discuss further, as the relative quiet of the upstairs passage was disturbed by the pounding footsteps, in unison, of two twelve-year old boys, running at near breakneck speed past the doorway, one of them holding a large wooden object whose purpose was as yet unknown.

 

“John! James! Where are you going with that -- Herschel!”

 

The last of the party, a well-formed youth of twenty-two, at least pulled himself up short, stopping in the doorway to heed his father. 

 

“They want to launch it off the garret window to see how it flies, Papa,” his son replied. “It is a...a glider. We were discussing Newton, and James’s mind ran to birds. We are going to read about Signor Bernoulli afterwards.”

 

“Then why ever are  _ you _ going?” Hewlett senior asked with interest.

 

“To make sure no one falls out of the window,” his son said patiently. Andromeda smiled at that.

 

If Andromeda Hewlett was her father’s creature, then Edmund Herschel Hewlett was his mother’s. The eldest child and the oldest boy, Herschel (so called by the family to avoid any confusion with his papa) was more like Anna Hewlett than his father, however much the latter had been involved in his naming -- inclined less to science and natural philosophy and more to history, literature, and rhetoric. While the other children bounded through experiments in their father’s vein, Herschel inclined his ear to debate and logic -- carefully assisted by his mother. He had been sent up to Oxford, where he had thrived, and was now pursuing a clerkship in Lincoln’s Inns to pursue the study of that greatest of ladies, the Law. It would not be a grand living, but he possessed a happy talent for the practice, and if he were successful in his endeavors (and his parents were quite sure he would be) then the profits from such a practice would be great enough to oversee the needs of Langfield for many years to come.

 

His father, at least, was determined that his children would all have professions to fall back upon as he had not.

 

Placated that this was in the name of Science, Hewlett’s face lost its concerned cast. “Very well then.”

 

“Come on, Herschel!” One of the twins appeared back in the doorway, tugging on his elder brother’s arm. “The wind’s going to change.”

 

“John, I hope you have anticipated where the craft will land,” his father said sternly from his desk. “We do not need any more forays into the pond.”

 

“Yes, Papa,” John said, a little sullen. 

 

“And have you a pen and paper to hand? Because it’s not science if-”

 

“...you don’t write it down,” all three Hewlett children chorused along with their father. The senior Hewlett looked consternated for a moment that his children were mocking him, but then, seeing the smiles (and knowing looks) on the faces of his two eldest, had to turn his frown into a furtive smile.  “We know, Papa, James has the writing desk,” John reported.

 

“Where is your mother?” Hewlett asked with somewhat concerned interest, knowing, as all of them did, that Anna Hewlett would not be pleased with the news that all three of her sons were going to be throwing large objects out of her upper story windows.

 

“She’s gone with Sylvie to take Mrs. Hepplewite a pudding and arrowroot,” Herschel reported, while James made a face at the thought of the arrowroot mixture their mother seemed to feed them any of the children were the least bit queasy. “Her daughter was feeling poorly.”

 

“Yes, well, conclude your experiments before she returns,” their father said with a grim look. “And we shall say nothing of this later, is that understood?”

 

The younger boy nodded, rushing off again and letting his older brother follow a few steps behind. Hewlett considered the doorway, and then turned his attention back to his desk. “He will make sure they don’t fall out of the window,” he said, as if reminding himself of his eldest child’s presence, and returned to his calculations.

 

Andromeda allowed herself her own smile, happy that her brother’s presence meant she would be dispatched to oversee her brothers (it had happened) and returned to her own drawing, while Cassie’s fingers continued in rapid determination downstairs.

 

Edmund Hershel, Andromeda, and Cassiopeia Hewlett had all graced the world with their presence before Anna Hewlett’s sensibilities triumphed over her husband’s in the naming of her children. Cassie was followed several years later by twins, given sensible first names (John and James) with the celestial references demanded by their father (Rigel and Altair) relegated to middle names. The Hewlett’s last child, an unexpected arrival six years after her brothers, was her mother’s entirely, and given the altogether more suitable name of Sylvia, with no mention at all made of stars or astronomers. (Though it was, her father consoled himself, a reference to Shakespeare, which was a great comfort to him.)

 

Herschel had the law, and ‘Meda her plants and drawings, and Cassie her music, the twins their riotous engagement with anything that promised movement and Sylvie, too young still for playing favorites with her studies, enjoyed them all. A happy household, everyone with his or her own projects and agendas, all children studiously engaged -- though it provoked gossip, around the neighborhood, to know that the Misses Hewlett painted prettily and sang and played, but debated and argued alongside their brother, too and that all the Hewlett children, girls and boys alike, could at least boil water for their tea, and at a pinch survive a few days out of doors in unhealthy climates. (Their father had been adamant they learn that, for reasons he had never really shared.)

 

It was an upbringing, Andromeda had long ago decided, that she would not trade for the world -- however much the other mothers like the Hamptons would talk about it at the village assembly rooms. (They would say it was because Mrs. Hewlett was an American, but that was not  _ really _ the reason, she did not think -- her mother simply came from a world in which more had been demanded of her, and thus more required that she teach her children.)

 

“Have you any idea when Reverend Scoles returns?” Her father asked from his side of the room, breaking the stillness once more.

 

“No,” she admitted. “He did not say. But it surely cannot take so long to settle an uncle’s estate. It has been nearly three weeks, has it not?”

 

“Indeed. That is one of his plants, is it not?”

 

Andromeda nodded, considering the orchid on her desk. It was quickly becoming one of her favorites -- even more so than the showy South Sea orchids one of her father’s friends had brought back from a collecting trip. But perhaps it was because William -- because  _ Reverend Scoles _ \-- had collected it?

 

No, of course not. That was not the reason for it. It was an altogether superior plant in all respects. That she should privilege one over another because of the giver…

 

She looked at her father and found him curiously engaged in his calculations again, and decided it was time for a walk before anything else was said or insinuated. Perhaps she  _ would _ have breakfast, before her mother returned.

 

A cold roll from the breakfast table and a piece of fruit were deemed sufficient and bolted down in perfunctory fashion, and then, suitably nourished, she made her way to the drawing room and her sister’s company

 

Cassiopeia was still clamoring away at her pianoforte when her sister came downstairs, stopping here and there to go over a passage again in half-time a few times to perfect the sequence and then pick it up again at the usual tempo. She hardly noticed when her sister settled into the settee with her book, her concentration broken only when they heard the sounds of the front door and their littlest sister’s voice, in the hall, shouting “We’re home!” to anyone who cared to listen.

 

“Hush, Sylvie, we shouldn’t shout,” they heard their mother admonish gently in the front hall. “Who’s about?”

 

“Cassie and Meda are in here,” Andromeda replied, as loudly as she dared, from her seat, not looking up from her book. Her sister’s music did not pause for even the briefest of seconds, though she did manage a ‘Hello, mother’ over her shoulder as the woman herself came in, divesting herself of her hat and the basket she had probably been carrying the pudding in.

 

Andromeda had always thought her mother one of the handsomest women in the world. At nearly fifty (and with six spirited children behind her) Anna Hewlett could no longer claim the benefit of youth, but the lines of her face were still strong and vivid, her dark eyes kind and observant of everything. Though there was now a touch of gray in her hair, and her stays did not lace quite as tightly as they had when she had first married, she was still a woman of uncommon good looks -- good looks everyone told Andromeda she had inherited, though she was not inclined to believe them when they said it. (Her nose was too wide, and her eyes --- well, but what is a pair of eyes, anyway?)

 

“Andromeda, you have better have eaten breakfast before you started reading,” her mother threatened gently, observing the book in her eldest’s hands. 

 

“I did,” she said, hardly looking up from the page. “I was perfectly good.”

 

“Good -- but you shall have to put it down again, for we have company. You shall not guess who we ran into on the road today.” She sounded particularly pleased with herself.

 

Andromeda paused, wondering if -- but no, Mama, would not -- 

 

“Miss Hewlett.”

 

‘Miss Hewlett’ sat up and turned quickly towards the door, seeing the figure behind her mother for the first time and nearly falling over in her attempt to rise and render appropriate greetings.

 

“Reverend Scoles!” Her hand flew up to her hair, haphazardly jumbled onto her head and half-hidden behind a scarf, as had suited this morning’s artistic endeavors. The Reverend William Scoles, a young man of scarcely thirty with sandy-brown hair and the kind of youthful good looks that little old ladies of all parishes love to fuss over, hid a smile and turned his hat in his hands as he stepped into the room, obviously just as embarrassed to pay this unannounced call as Andromeda was to receive it.

 

“I chanced upon your mother and sister on the way back from Mrs. Hepplewite’s -- she mentioned you might be at home today and suggested I pay a call.” He said this with an apologetic tone, his eyes not wavering once from Andromeda's.

 

Now that she observed her, ‘Meda noticed that her mother  _ looked _ very pleased with herself, too. “I did not realize the Reverend would be home so soon, did you, Andromeda?” Mrs. Hewlett asked, disappearing from the room for a moment to rid herself of the basket.

 

“We found you a plant!” Sylvie announced proudly, jumping onto the couch alongside her sister. “Mr. Scoles, show ‘Meda what we found!”

 

“I should like you to know that it was Sylvia who found it -- I merely brought it home for her,” the Reverend corrected, somewhat amused,  digging into one of the pockets of his black coat (Was it new? It did not seem quite so threadbare as when she had seen him last) and drawing out a carefully folded handkerchief, which he presented to Andromeda with an abbreviated smile. Andromeda, mindful that the last plant Sylvia brought home had still contained a worm within its roots, carefully unfolded the handkerchief (her fingers could not help but touch the WS embroidered on the corner) to reveal an entire violet, roots and all, carefully flattened to preserve the shape. A common flower -- but Sylvie would get excited about things.

 

“What a nice specimen, Sylvie! And such a fine job preserving the roots. We shall have to sketch it later today. Go upstairs and fetch a paper so the Reverend may have his handkerchief back.”

 

“Keep it,” He encouraged, almost too quickly. “I have others.”

 

They exchanged brief smiles and Andromeda folded up the handkerchief, setting it aside on the table so it would not be lost on the settee. “How was your journey?” she asked, trying not to say or do anything that would make her mother smile wider than she was already. “Was it ...very taxing, at your uncle’s?”

 

“Not at all,” he admitted. “The funeral was as it should have been, very well attended, very well spoken. And it was not...too hard dispose of his estate; my aunt died some years ago, so there was nothing to worry about there. And I have some...some furniture of my own now, and a little money from the sale of his books.” He said all this with the manner of a man who is trying to make it sound as if it matters very little when in fact it matters a great deal -- a nuance that was not lost on Andromeda, or her mother. He cleared his throat and  stood again, searching his pocket again.“I...erm, that is to say...my uncle was a very keen admirer of flowers, and I thought...I thought of you when I saw this.”

 

He had withdrawn from his pocket a small volume with a well-broken spine, its corners a little flattened with use, and handed it to her, careful that she should take it with the covers closed. Andromeda took the book and gently examined the title page. “ _ Flora Devoniae _ ! Oh, I have been meaning to read this for ages!”

 

“You should look inside,” Scoles announced, sitting back in his chair a little. She turned a page and was surprised to see that nestled in between the pages, a pressed flower specimen -- the same, in fact, as was illustrated on the facing page -- nearly fell out of the book. “It is not quite full,” he apologized. “But there are a great many of them in there. I believe he pressed them in another book and stored them there for reference. Like an Herbarium.”

 

So much work, over so many years. And that he would think of her, when he himself loved botany as much as she --- It was almost enough to make her cry. “This is wonderful. Thank you.”

 

“Happy to oblige.” He studied the book a moment and then seemed to realize the lateness of his stay, and perhaps, the attention Mrs. Hewlett was now fixing upon him. “I should not keep you,” he announced quickly, rising from his chair. “I have promised Widow Barclay I would look in on her when I returned and she will worry if she hears I have been about without seeing her.”

 

“We will not detain you,” Mrs. Hewlett said with an understanding smile. “I would not cross Mrs. Barclay myself if I could help it. Are you expected at Lady Hampton’s, on Friday?”

 

“I was invited, yes.” His answer did not sound certain -- he hadn’t  _ planned  _ to go, then. A practical choice -- as one of the single gentleman in the neighborhood, Andromeda knew his attendance at these things was carefully monitored by all the families of a certain age with daughters -- a fact he had told her once he hated.

 

“Cassie is playing, and I think Herschel will come, too, he has not to be back in London for another week. And Andromeda, of course.” Was that a scheme she saw in her mother’s eye? She hoped Scoles had not seen and tried not to let her cheeks turn too red.

 

“Then I shall be sure not to miss it,” the clergyman promised, bowing his good-byes to Mrs. Hewlett, Cassie, and Andromeda, in turn, before heading for the door and showing himself out.

 

Andromeda felt herself release the breath she had been holding in and turned on her mother. “Mama!”

 

“We did meet him on the road, dear, and he did mention that he wished to see you.” Mrs. Hewlett held her daughter’s angry gaze for a moment and threw up her hands. “Oh, heavens, ‘Meda, I was twenty once and in love, too, you know. He wanted to speak of it, and now he has. Better than anything any young man of mine ever did.”

 

“Any young man of yours?” Cassie turned on her piano stool, now very much intrigued. “Mama! This is a tale we have not heard before -- do tell!”

 

But Mrs. Hewlett had remembered herself, and would offer no more on the subject, not even under Cassie’s hardest urging.

 

“Do you suppose it was during the War?” Cassie mused, wondering, for the seventeenth or eighteenth time that day, on the identity of the young man to whom their mother had alluded earlier. It was now early evening, and Cook would be calling that dinner was ready at any moment. “Before she met Papa?”

 

“Undoubtedly,” Andromeda replied, increasingly weary of the subject her sister had tried all afternoon to riddle out. “She did marry Papa afterwards, and she was nearly thirty when she had Herschel. That is a long time to fill with love affairs.”

 

“Mama, having love affairs? I can’t imagine it. It’s too horrid.”

 

“Cassie, will you please let it rest? She will not speak of it, and we should not press her. It is not fair to her. She ought to be allowed some secrets.”

 

Cassie scowled, but said no more, finally flouncing out of the bedroom the two girls shared to head back to her piano. She could be heard downstairs playing a very melancholic tune that her sister had to suppose was to indicate some mourning for her lack of information, or some other emotional nonsense. Cassie would say and do the most  _ artistic  _ things sometimes, which drove her sister wild with annoyance. But she was Cassie, and Andromeda would not trade her for anything, despite the pitfalls that came with being her sister.

 

But it was confusing, to think of one’s mother in the time before she knew one’s father, to think of her with other men and wonder what sort of person she might have been if she, Andromeda, had been born in another place, in another family. Supposing that she had never left America, had married this...this mysterious man who had loved her mother when she was a shy maid of twenty? (Well, perhaps not shy, Andromeda could not quite picture her mother as shy.)

 

She knew more than Cassie did about her parents -- she listened better than her sister did. She knew that when they first met they had not liked each other, and that their affection had grown slowly over time. She knew that her mother’s family had not been wealthy, for her father had spoken of meeting her in a tavern. (Her own mother, a barmaid? It had surprised her when she first heard it, but her father wouldn’t lie about such things, would he?) But her mother spoke very seldomly about her life in America, before the war, though she was always quick to jump into an argument with anyone who spoke ill of the country.

 

There was a knocking at her door, and she looked up, seeing her mother’s face tentatively peeking through the doorway. “May I come in?”

 

Andromeda nodded, and her mother opened the door wider, closing it carefully behind her.

 

“I wanted to explain myself a bit about Reverend Scoles, earlier,” she offered, watching her daughter’s eyes carefully. “It was not fair of me to bring him home like that, I agree, but I had very good reasons for doing what I did.”

 

“Have they to do with the mystery lover Cassie seems determined to unearth?”

 

Her mother looked embarrassed. “Yes, I...I am afraid they do.”  She settled herself on the end of the bed and considered the backs of her hands,and then looked long and hard at her daughter, carefully choosing what to say. “When I was...about the same age you are, there was a...a boy that I was in love with. I had known him a long time, and it was...popularly supposed that we would be married.”

 

Andromeda nodded, realizing, as her mother said this, struggling to meet her eyes, that this secret, this piece of information, signified a kind of contract between them, a higher sort of trust then anything that had ever been before. For her mother looked...frightened? Afraid?   _ Afraid of me? Of what I might say, and how I might judge her?  _  She immediately decided that whatever her mother said in this moment would never be heard by Cassie. 

 

“His brother died,” her mother went on. “And he... took it upon himself to uphold a contract that had been written between his father and the father of a... young lady, for the marriage of their two children.” She paused, trying to make sure her daughter understood her thus far.

 

“He broke off your engagement for his brother’s fiancee?”  _ Mama, that’s awful.  _ Suddenly Andromeda wanted to know this mystery person and give him a piece of her mind -- what business had he, making her mother hurt like that? 

 

“Well, we were not really engaged, but yes, something like that. There was...some other buisness involved, which is not really relevant, but yes, the short version is that he married this young woman and left me.”

 

“And then you met Papa?” Andromeda supplied, trying to follow and hoping she had it right, praying that the happy ending that she had spent so much of her childhood building her own hopes upon came sooner rather than later.

 

Her mother’s usually calm face slipped a little further into anxiety. “Your papa comes a little after -- for you see,  after this, I married someone else.  A man I ...felt affection for, but did not love.” Her mother’s gaze dropped to her hands again. “Meda, I tell you this story because my happiness for...for nearly two years was cruelly taken from me because the young man’s family did not approve of me, and he had never spoken of our arrangement to them because he was afraid of what they would say. Reverend Scoles is a kind and good man, and one that I think will do very well for you for the simple reason that he is very concerned with the manner of his being able to keep you after you are married, which I think a very admirable quality, especially in one so young. Your sister will speak very highly of marrying for love and artistic ideals, but there is something to be said for marrying sound business principles as well.” She drew a breath, aware she was rambling, and continued. “I approve of him, immensely, and your father approves of him, and we wish him to know this -- at least for my part because I do not want to see you make the same mistakes I did. So if your mama indulges in some amateur dramatics in order to get him in the house, then so be it.”

 

Andromeda suddenly felt very small, feeling the burden of this, her mother’s biggest secret, on her shoulders. A thought occurred to her. “What happened to him?

 

“My first husband?” Anna Hewlett looked a little perplexed. 

 

She realized she did want the answer to that question, too, but in this moment her first was of more importance, and she did not wish to press her luck. “No, the...the other man. The man who married someone else. Did he...regret it?”

 

Her mother’s face was suddenly very sad. “He did,” she said, finally, thinking, doubtless, of a face some twenty five years gone. “He regretted it very much.”

 

“Do you regret it?”

 

Her mother looked at her with sympathetic horror, suddenly very aware of what she had done. “Oh, Meda, no! For if it had not been for him, I should not have met your father, and I should not have had six wonderful children. He may regret all he likes -- but I will never, ever, regret this.” She wrapped her arms tightly around her daughter, and Andromeda felt her eyes close, content, for the moment, to merely feel her mother’s love, her strong arms and her stays and the faint hint of scent that clung to her. And it suddenly became clear to her, as it had never been clear before, just how strong her mother really was -- to have such things in her life, yes, but to have them happen and never speak of them to anyone. Did her father know these things? She supposed he did.

 

When she thought her daughter sufficiently recovered, Anna Hewlett broke away, furtively wiping a tear out of her eye and going downstairs to superintend dinner, and her daughter, feeling very much at sea, rose from her seat on her bed to find a sheet of paper and her pencils. Cassie would play her piano furiously, and the twins would run away, and Sylvie would cry and beg to be held, but when Andromeda was in a tempest she would draw. Familiar shapes, calm shapes. But no orchids rose from her pencil today, no wildflowers. Instead, she found herself drawing her mother’s face as it must have appeared when young -- her face, a little, but with some touches from the portrait in the hall that her father had commissioned when they were first married. The determined brow and dark eyes, the curling hair, the nose that Meda wished she had inherited instead of her father’s severe one. Suddenly the portrait under her pencil seemed to be of a woman she did not know.

 

What other secrets did her mother have? 

 

_ Do I even wish to know them? _

 

**Author's Note:**

> I often wonder what the Culpers would have thought of thier efforts, twenty years down the road. We have Tallmadge's memoirs, which mention nothing, and the Townsend family papers, which again say very little. What must Anna think of her part? (And *does* her husband know of her involvement? A question for a different pen than mine, unfortunately.) I intended this to be an upbeat, cute thing and seem to have steered it a little off course in the process. My sincere apologies.
> 
> I am not certain of my Latin on 'Sound Mind in an Unsound Space' but Google Translate was not obliging and none of my classicist friends were online today.
> 
> Anacamptis morio, the green-winged orchid that Andromeda is sketching at the beginning, is a native orchid found in the south of England. They are rather pretty.
> 
> Flora Devoniae, as an aside, is the name of the book Edward Ferrars gives Elinor Dashwood in the 2008 version of Sense and Sensibility. Having just returned my books on 18th century Botany back to the library, I was at a loss for a better text. (Speaking of Jane Austen, apologies to her for the rampant borrowing of Marianne Dashwood as Cassiopeia Hewlett.)


End file.
